League Season Begins With a Draw

Forfar Athletic 2 Cowdenbeath 2

After the two successful cup encounters of previous weeks, Station Park hosted the opening match of Forfar Athletic's league campaign for the season 2011/2012. Cowdenbeath were the visitors and having spent last season in Division One, they would no doubt provide a tough test.

The Boss brought back Greg Paterson and Graham Gibson to the starting line up, with Grant Adam listed as a substitute and Martyn Fotheringham suspended.

The Loons created the first chance of the match in the very first minute, Kevin Byers angling a pass towards Greg Ross from the left and the defender struck a sweet shot from 25 yards only to see his effort end up inches over. Five minutes later it was the visitor's turn to shoot just over when Jordan Morton cut inside from the right and drove in a shot. Chris Templeman was soon producing the trickery loved by Forfar fans and won a free kick right on the edge of the penalty box. Kevin Byers floated over the ball which was won by Templeman and headed towards Graham Gibson who just failed to make contact before the danger was cleared.

Cowdenbeath opened the scoring when MARK RAMSAY ran into the penalty box and drove low, and although Paterson did well to stop his first effort, he could do nothing to stop the follow up being hammered into the net from close range. On the half hour mark, Byers swung over a dangerous cross which Stevie Crawford failed to make proper contact with and the chance went begging.  For the remainder of the half both defences were on top, and the visitors went in a goal to the good.

Cowdenbeath won a corner three minutes into the second half and from the kick John Armstrong won the ball, turned and shot low, with Paterson doing well to save the effort. After this chance, Forfar started to take control of the match and it was no surprise when the equaliser arrived after 58 minutes. A cross from the right was won by Templeman who laid the ball into the path of MARK MCCULLOCH, last season's player of the year made no mistake from six yards out. Four minutes later and the Loons took the lead. Greg Ross was judged to have been impeded and TEMPLEMAN buried the ball into the back of the net to make the score 2-1.

Forfar remained on top, and almost grabbed goal number three when Byers made the most of indecision in the Cowdenbeath defence and fired at goal from a tight angle, the ball rebounded off the woodwork. The Loons were soon made to pay for some poor marking. The ball was lost in midfield, one pass and two touches later and COULT had lifted the ball over Paterson and into the net. This gave the Fife outfit a lift and they were in control for the final ten minutes. In fact they almost grabbed the winner with the last kick of the game. Marc McKenzie broke clear after a Forfar move broke down and as Paterson came out to narrow the angle, McKenzie fired past the Forfar keeper and past the post.

A draw was a fair result in the end with both sides picking up a point.

Match Report by Kevin Brown